Late Roman army in Britain (Comes Britannia)

Introduction

This all started after playing some games of Dux Bellorum in 28mm and then a friend introduced me to Basic Impetus, and he had amassed a number of 6mm armies based on the wars between Rome and Carthage. I've alway
had an interest in the Dark Ages period so I decided to start collecting armies for this. My decision was influenced by the completeness of 6mm ranges available, finding a period I knew
something about, and some reasonably balanced historical opponents. The rules I chose were Basic Impetus but these will also work for Dux Bellorum (another set I play), or even DBA.

I ended up with a number of Basic Impetus/Dux Bellorum sized armies for the Dark Ages England (although I have been a bit loose with the history) and I went with Baccus
figures from their Late Roman range. They have a good selection and I can cover any extras with Rapier, or even Microworld.

This Roman army is based on the army of around the 4th century before they departed Britain completely. I wanted to extoll the virtues of massed 6mm figures so I went with 80mm frontage and
30mm depth, and as many figures as I could on the bases.

6mm Wargaming

Click on the thumbnails to see the full sized image. Note these are about 4 times large than real so it isn't very flattering!

Roman command

With the Basic Impetus and Dux Bellorum army lists, the General is part of a unit, and in this case they were based in a Equites Honoriani Taifali luniores Cavalry unit. I used
Heavy cavalry figures along with some Roman generals for this unit. Painting the snake design onto the shield was fun and the colourful shield makes the figures look great.

Roman Legionaries

From my research, there was up to 4 legions in Britain during this time, but I wasn't able to identify which legions these were. I went with a popular shield pattern that I have
seen a lot of pictures off, but I dont know which legion it came from.

More Legionaries

Each legion base had 48 figures crammed on in 3 ranks each with 16 figures. As I only need 2 units of legions for the army a single pack of 96 figures was perfect. For
this unit I painted a more complicated shield design and one which looks great on 6mm figures. It was hard work but a good shield design really makes 6mm figures stand out IMHO.

Cataphracts (Equites Catafractarii Iuniores)

Great models and relatively easy to paint and no difficult shield patterns! There was one unit of these stationed in Britain for a while so it was a good excuse to paint them
and add something unique to the army. I tried to base them closely together as I assumed that they would fight in close order.

Light Cavalry

Great figures from Baccus and the finished result is very good. I was unable to find out much about which units were stationed in Britain so I went with a generic red shield design for this base.

More light cavalry

Another light cavalry unit. Nice figures and the command figures make the base look great. I went with plain
blue shields for this unit as again I couldn't find any information out about what they had.

Palatine Auxilia

These are the Baccus unarmoured Legionary figures which work well as Auxilary. This base represents the Invicti Iuniores Britanniciani Auxilia. I probably should have mixed in the guys without helmets but I didnt buy any! From
the front they look a lot like legions, but when viewing them from behind you can see the lack of armour.

Batavi luniores Britanniciani Auxilia

Another base of Auxilary, and this one is a Palatine Auxiliary unit of the Batavi luniores Britanniciani. The red part on the shield is
meant to be represent a dog, which is part of their shield design.

Exculcatores luniores Britanniciani Auxilia

Another base of Auxilary, and this one is a Palatine Auxiliary unit of the Exculcatores luniores Britanniciani. I wasn't sure after
researching this unit if the shields should have white or yellow backgrounds as there is conflicting images. The shields didn't come up well in the photos (one of the dangers of close up 6mm photography).

Skirmishers

These are the Roman Archers which are nice figures a couple of different poses/styles and no command figures. I tried to paint the red strips
that they have on their clothing but it is hard to see in the photos.